


A Form of Intimacy

by pyalgroundblz (acidtonguejenny)



Category: Dresden Files - Jim Butcher, Firefly
Genre: Crossover, Crossover Pairing, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-16
Updated: 2012-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-29 15:39:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/321477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acidtonguejenny/pseuds/pyalgroundblz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She has precious few experiences, little tastes of what she has given up for her calling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Form of Intimacy

She doesn't quite know what to make of him, at first sight. His body is a mess of contradictions, and plays merry hell with her Companion's talent of reading. Old eyes. Old, old eyes, sharply focused and entirely unclouded. Skin on his hands, neck, wherever she can see heavily scarred, all many years healed and faded. A strong spine, straight, tall, the fitness of a much younger man. It's as if he reaps only the benefits of old age, the wisdom and surety.

Inara controls the urge to approach him, to try her analytical skills against his voice. When Mal and the others finish their business, she follows them out with a final glance. They're bound outwards, always further from the core, looking for work.

Troubles with Serenity ground them unexpectedly, so much as such things can be by now. Zoe and Wash take the opportunity for a date in town, Kaylee and Simon for an approximation of one when the mechanic can sneak away. Jayne and Book take turns following River around the settlement. Mal gripes and stalks around in an ill-temper, as is his way. He snaps one too many times, those pointed comments that wound her far more than they should, and Inara follows the others' example and gives herself a tour.

Away from Serenity and desirous of diversion, she keeps a kohled eye out for strange man from before.

He's not difficult to find, lounging in the shade of a fruit-bearing tree a little crooked ways from of town. There is an open, blank-paged volume on the bench near him, a pen in the crease of it.

Inara approaches leisurely, gives him time to see her before she comes too close. He takes up the journal, and she settles on worn, roughly carved wood.

Later she isn't clearly able to recall what they discussed. The weather, probably, regret that the apples hanging, tempting overhead aren't quite ripe. She remembers running her hands over the leather of his book, the throb in her unsupported back after hours of sitting.

In quiet, lonely moments in her shuttle, she sometimes thinks of the warmth of his arm when it grew cold that night, the heavy notes of his voice. Imagines the harsh scratch of short beard, the weight of his long body and soil underneath her, smell of apples all around. Companions sacrifice a form intimacy for mastery of all others, Inara has always known this in some way. Moreso now than during her years of training, or fresh from the school. She has precious few experiences, little tastes of what she has given up for her calling. Some memories are marked by space-cold and gunmetal, some by core plant traffic sounds, and others by dappled shade and Earth-silver.

**Author's Note:**

> I really, really wish Harry/Inara wasn't such a crack pairing. Random headcanon has it that genuine Earth silver is rare and very expensive in Firefly continuity.


End file.
